The Neighborhood Project: Using Evolution to Improve My City, One Block at a Time
448The Neighborhood Project: Using Evolution to Improve My City, One Block at a Time
448Hardcover
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Overview
Inspired to become an agent of change, Wilson descended on Binghamton with a scientist's eye and looked at its toughest questions, such as how to empower neighborhoods and how best to teach our children. He combined the latest research methods from experimental economics with studies of holiday decorations and garage sales. Drawing upon examples from nature as diverse as water striders, wasps, and crows, Wilson's scientific odyssey took him around the world, from a cave in southern Africa that preserved the dawn of human culture to the Vatican in Rome. Along the way, he spoke with dozens of fellow scientists, whose stories he relates along with his own.
Wilson's remarkable findings help us to understand how we must become wise managers of evolutionary processes to accomplish positive change at all scales, from effective therapies for individuals, to empowering neighborhoods, to regulating the worldwide economy.
With an ambitious scope that spans biology, sociology, religion, and economics, The Neighborhood Project is a memoir, a practical handbook for improving the quality of life, and an exploration of the big questions long pondered by religious sages, philosophers, and storytellers. Approaching the same questions from an evolutionary perspective shows, as never before, how places define us.
Product Details
ISBN-13: | 9780316037679 |
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Publisher: | Little, Brown and Company |
Publication date: | 08/24/2011 |
Pages: | 448 |
Sales rank: | 933,262 |
Product dimensions: | 9.34(w) x 6.42(h) x 1.35(d) |
About the Author
In addition to his own research, Wilson manages programs that expand the scope of evolutionary science in higher education, public policy, community-based research, and the study of religion.
Table of Contents
Introduction: The Listener 3
Chapter 1 Evolution, Cities, and the World 9
Chapter 2 My City 27
Chapter 3 The Parable of the Strider 40
Chapter 4 The Parable of the Wasp 59
Chapter 5 The Maps 80
Chapter 6 Quantifying Halloween 92
Chapter 7 We Are Now Entering the Noosphere 102
Chapter 8 The Parable of the Immune System 125
Chapter 9 The Reflection 139
Chapter 10 Street-Smart 163
Chapter 11 The Humanist and the Ceo 181
Chapter 12 The Lost Island of Prevention Science 192
Chapter 13 The Lecture That Failed 216
Chapter 14 Learning from Mother Nature about Teaching Our Children 229
Chapter 15 The World with Us 253
Chapter 16 The Parable of the Crow 272
Chapter 17 Our Lives, Our Genes 289
Chapter 18 The Natural History of the Afterlife 305
Chapter 19 Evonomics 332
Chapter 20 Body and Soul 353
Chapter 21 City on a Hill 379
Acknowledgments 391
Notes 393
References 405
Index 421